'He Said That Raping Me Is His Prayer to God'

“He told me that according to Islam he is allowed to rape an unbeliever. He said that by raping me, he is drawing closer to God. … He said that raping me is his prayer to God.”

These extraordinary statements come from girls who were kept as sex slaves by jihadis of the Islamic State, as reported in a lengthy and revealing New York Times piece that was published Thursday.

Not only does the piece illustrate the horrifying ordeal that Yazidi and other non-Muslim women endure at the hands of the Islamic State when they are forced into sexual slavery, but -- most surprisingly -- the article explains in detail how these monsters believe they are pleasing their bloodthirsty god by destroying these girls.

Reported the Times’ Rukmini Callimachi:

In the moments before he raped the 12-year-old girl, the Islamic State fighter took the time to explain that what he was about to do was not a sin. Because the preteen girl practiced a religion other than Islam, the Quran not only gave him the right to rape her -- it condoned and encouraged it, he insisted.

Both before and after he raped her, he prostrated himself in Islamic prayer:

“He told me,” the girl recounted, “that according to Islam he is allowed to rape an unbeliever. He said that by raping me, he is drawing closer to God.”

This was no isolated incident. A fifteen-year-old girl who had been forced into sex slavery recalled:

“He kept telling me this is ibadah” -- that is, worship of Allah. “He said that raping me is his prayer to God. I said to him, ‘What you’re doing to me is wrong, and it will not bring you closer to God.’ And he said, ‘No, it’s allowed. It’s halal.’”

All this is reminiscent of Hamas’ statement:

“Killing Jews is worship that draws us closer to God.”

What kind of god is this?

What kind of moral blindness has overtaken non-Muslim leaders? They sit and drink tea and “dialogue” with Muslim clerics while being careful to avoid mention of anything like this -- if they’re even aware of it at all -- much less ask them what they’re doing to combat within Muslim communities the theological basis for sex slavery.

It must be faced: in Islamic texts and teachings, sucha theological basis manifestly exists.

The Times quotes Kecia Ali, an academic Islamic apologist at Boston University:

In the milieu in which the Quran arose, there was a widespread practice of men having sexual relationships with unfree women.

"Unfree women": for some reason, Ali doesn’t want to say the word “slave.” She goes on to claim:

[I]t wasn’t a particular religious institution. It was just how people did things.

However -- and surprisingly, considering the track record -- the Times had the integrity to cite Cole Bunzel of Princeton University. The article noted that Bunzel points out:

[There are] numerous references to the phrase "Those your right hand possesses" in the Quran, which for centuries has been interpreted to mean female slaves. He also points to the corpus of Islamic jurisprudence, which continues into the modern era and which he says includes detailed rules for the treatment of slaves.

...

There is a great deal of scripture that sanctions slavery. You can argue that it is no longer relevant and has fallen into abeyance. ISIS would argue that these institutions need to be revived, because that is what the Prophet and his companions did.